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Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
What is LANCER?


LANCER (which I'll probably stop writing in all caps from here on) is a roleplaying game of tactical mech combat in the far future by Tom Parkinson-Morgan (writer and illustrator of Kill 6 Billion Demons) and Miguel Lopez. Players take on the role of mech pilots doing mech pilot things. It's giant robots with guns and swords, you know how this works.

The default setting takes place in the distant future where humanity nearly went extinct, crawled back out of the wreckage, then discovered the records left behind by their predecessors. The current generation of humans, discovering that they weren't in fact the first civilization to arise on earth and in fact that humanity had very nearly ceased to exist, decided that the best way to ensure that nothing like that could ever happen again was to aggressively expand and colonize as much of the universe as possible, so that the human race would never again be in danger of dying out. This sprawling bureaucratic hegemony is Union (not The Union, just Union) whose values are the propagation of the human race across the stars and a generally decent standard of living given that sophisticated 3D printers allow for the quick and easy manufacture of material goods, meaning that core Union worlds exist in a state of quasi post-scarcity.

Of course what Union wants to guarantee and what they can actually guarantee are two different things. Settled space is big and while Union tries to maintain a nominal presence on all settled worlds there's still a vast gulf of difference between a prosperous and technologically advanced core world and a freshly settled planet out on the fringes of space. There are slave states, pirates, tyrants and despots, revolutions, religious conflicts, and good old fashioned wars over territory, resources, and ideology, which is where all those mechs come in handy. In addition to these myriad dangers there are even bigger threats looming over Union, such as the Aun Ecumene, a divergent offshoot of humanity on a holy crusade against Union, as well as the specter of RA, a staggeringly powerful godlike AI with inscrutable motives whose self-actuated birth led to the creation of paracausal technology, such as the faster-than-light blinkgates which make interstellar travel far more convenient, the omninet which links Union's worlds together economically and culturally, and sophisticated if not quite godlike AI systems (the polite term is Non-Human Persons, or NHPs) far in advance of anything human programmers were capable of creating up to that point, among other things.

Thematically Lancer's mechs borrow heavy inspiration from Titanfall. They aren't necessarily hyper anime mecha blasting around the battlefield at mach 5 (though you can make fast, flying mechs) nor are they the lumbering piles of shoeboxes you see in Battletech (though there are big stompy options for people who like that too). Mechs come in a variety of styles, with various stat modifiers and built-in core systems, and you're then invited to equip them with whatever weapons and miscellaneous equipment you have access to via the license system. Since major manufacturing is printer-based, you don't buy mechs with money because there's no need. Instead you collect licenses from various corporations and collectives as you rise in renown, which give you permission to print off various pieces of equipment as you see fit. Mechs aren't cherished heirlooms handed down from one generation to the next. Your mech get blown up? Hey, that sucks, head back to base and print a new one. Between missions you're free to reconfigure your mech however you like. A lot of times you won't even take your mech with you if you travel from one planet to the next to save on space, simply printing out a new one when you arrive at your destination.

The various license providers you'll have access to in the core rulebook, informally referred to as The Big Five, are:

General Massive Systems or GMS. If Amazon sold mechs and wound up getting nationalized, they'd be GMS. Effectively the official supplier of all sorts of things to Union, GMS is available to every pilot from the word go, and consequently their gear tends to be plain and functional and not much else. In game terms, GMS is the basic equipment list everyone has access to for when you just need a regular assault rifle.
These guys don't have any art yet! So sad.

IPS-Northstar. IPS-N fuckin hates pirates so goddamn much. A corporation specializing in shipping and spacelane security, IPS-N's mechs trend towards the chunky and tough, with a lot of aggressive close-quarters options for boarding and counter-boarding operations. If you want chainaxes, giant spike cannons, weaponized drills, and 40K-style bolters, these guys (and gals) are for you. Great for people who like playing Terran in Starcraft.


Smith-Shimano Corpro. These guys are the Lambourgini manufacturers of the mech world. Full of flashy tech, nimble frames, and custom leather seats, SSC mechs are perfect for the guy who insists he has to play a ninja in every single game or just someone who really likes being a smug douchebag. Railguns, monoswords, missiles, and cloaking devices all all things you're likely to find on offer within SSC's licenses. They're also really big into Gattaca-style eugenics.


Horus. Horus is a decentralized collective of hackers and techno-weirdos who may or may not worship RA. They aren't a corporation, and the licenses they give out tend to be awarded based on meeting their obscure criteria, given for reasons known only to themselves. Horus pilots are the most likely to unironically refer to themselves as "cyberpunks." In game terms Horus licenses are typically focused around electronic warfare, hacking, drones, and other weird, esoteric warfare technologies.


Harrison Armory. An imperialistic corporation-state that used to license their stuff out through GMS before realizing hey, wait a minute, we can go into business for ourselves. Thematically HA isn't as focused as the other corps, but what you find within its licenses are a strong emphasis on directed energy weapons along with the biggest focus on paracausal technology courtesy of the HA Think Tank which comes up with crazy poo poo like stasis fields, phasing ammunition, and blinkspace guns. They're also the only corporation to have a mech designed specifically for committing planetary genocide, so that's fun too.


What's the system like?

Mechanically Lancer is a mashup between Shadow of the Demon Lord, 4th edition Dungeons & Dragons, and a splash of Apocalypse World. The basic resolution mechanic is a 1d20 check against a target number, generally a TN of 10 unless it's an attack of some sort in which case it's against the target's defense. Any roll of 20+ (not a natural 20, just any roll which adds up to 20 or more) is a critical success. Instead of floating modifiers you have Accuracy and Difficulty which are just boons and banes from Shadow of the Demon Lord where each point of Accuracy lets you roll 1d6, then you take the highest Accuracy die rolled and use that as a bonus, while Difficulty works the same way in reverse, and Accuracy and Difficulty dice cancel each other out 1 for 1.

Combat is reminiscent of 4E D&D in that it heavily involves tactical movement, area effect attacks, and has a similar action economy and encounter pacing through periodic rests to use Repairs (aka healing surges) to top off between fights. There are no encounter or daily abilities outside of Core Powers which are your Titanfall-esque special abilities like shooting a giant fuckin laser beam that melts whatever it touches or launching a missile barrage that hits literally every enemy on the map. Otherwise any equipment which is limited operates off limited charges which get replenished whenever you take a full rest, aka go back to base. Roles don't exist but for those familiar with 4E it's not tremendously difficult to create mechs which get you somewhere in the ballpark. Enemy NPCs come in a variety of archetypes to which you pick options from a list of archetype-specific upgrades to customize them, so you could give your Assault NPCs underbarrel grenade launchers or high-velocity ammunition, or your Sniper might get a grappling hook or specialized ammo loads. Templates can also be applied to NPCs, turning them into easily killable Grunts or making them tougher by giving them a template like Veteran or Elite which makes them tougher to kill and grants them additional template-specific abilities.

Adding onto this are Talents, which are abilities that your pilot acquires as opposed to your mech. These can give you even more flexibility and ways to enhance your personal combat style whether you just want to go and wrestle with people or if you like being the guy handing out bonuses to your squadmates, or maybe you just want to shoot someone in the face better. Some talents will always be kind of obvious choices depending on what sort of build you're going for (are you planning on using rifles? Then you're probably going to take Crack Shot), but each talent tree is only three options deep and you get about 18 of them over the course of play which means there's plenty of room to dabble and branch out even after you've picked up the stuff that's centrally important to your character concept. Everything can be respecced so there's no dumb "plan your build out 15 levels in advance" bullshit.

Pilot-tier mechanics have gotten much more robust since the early iterations, now pilots have an actual list of skills to choose from, pilot gear including a variety of weapons, armor, and technical equipment, and new to the latest version is mechanically systemized downtime which is where the dollop of Apocalypse World flavor comes in.

I love giant robots, and also all those other things you said! Where can I get this game?

Right now Lancer is still in open beta playtesting mode, and lucky for you the latest version of the rules has just been released today! You can download it for free here.

Since this thread is probably going to fall off a cliff of inactivity after a dozen posts, where can I go to talk about this insanely cool game with other people?

There's an extremely active Lancer Discord channel which can be found here. It has channels for rules questions and feedback, homebrew design, lore discussions, LFG organization, and general chat.

There's also a Lancer Subreddit here that pretty much nobody uses now that the Discord channel exists but hey, you do you.

Here's the official Lancer Twitter. Yeah yeah, Twitter sucks, but Miguel posts a bunch of microfiction vignettes that are worth reading and this is also where you can find official updates, new art posts, and other assorted things worth keeping tabs on.

Also Patreons! If you want to drop the creators a bit of cash for their hard work you can do so. Miguel's Patreon is brand spanking new and Tom's is here.

Kai Tave fucked around with this message at 01:26 on Aug 30, 2018

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Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
People reserve the second post in a thread for stuff all the time and I have no idea what for, but who am I to go against tradition?

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

sponszi posted:

My group is really enjoying LANCER, 1.7 has some pretty big changes. Am I reading it correctly that the GMC drone systems are just normal weapons that target systems defense now?

All drones have been changed along those lines, yeah. Drones are weapons and take weapon mounts, and they target e-defense.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

sponszi posted:

They seem quite bad now, but maybe I'm just mourning the loss of my 6 autogun Pegasus build

Autoguns were extremely broken before yeah. The Autogun isn't really a drone by 1.7 standards now, it's a weapon which can fire on its own as an end-of-round action regardless of what else you did during your turn. It doesn't require any sort of lock on to do so or anything, and it also has a fairly substantial range compared to a lot of other weapons now.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

King of Solomon posted:

Based on what I'm seeing, their only real rules for pilot play is in the pilot vs mech space and for some downtime rules. Have any of you guys experimented with pure pilot vs pilot play? Like, say, you're actually exploring an infiltration into some enemy facility, no room for your mecha, the only thing you've got is your pilot and whatever pilot-scale weapons they can carry?

I feel like that's an important thing to have available to a mech game, and I'm not sure I've actually seen any exploration of it. Maybe I'm just missing some blatantly obvious thing, though.

I think pilot vs. pilot play might be more feasible now that pilot rules have expanded beyond the bare bones they used to be, but admittedly 1.7 literally just dropped today so everyone's still kind of scrambling to take it all in so who knows. I don't know that Lancer is ever going to be set up to really do a lot of non-mech action though.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

King of Solomon posted:

This is perfect, actually. Man, this game looks great.

Also now that I've skipped ahead some it looks like the NPC chapter now has a whole section on building infantry-scale opponents beyond just squads, so that's new. It looks like Tom really went all-in on this. You might honestly be able to run full dismounted sessions now, though I have no idea how well it'll play out in practice yet.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib


Another day, another piece of new artwork. Originally Tom hadn't planned on doing all the mech art himself but apparently that's changed, for the better in my opinion since I appreciate the unified style.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

akulanization posted:

The system is the best it has been, but still basically unplayable RAW. High end high tier enemies can have roughly 80-180 EHP and most weapons deal 2-6 damage on an average hit. Basically you can’t be happy getting the same stuff at 3rd level and 15th. Tiers need to not exist or effect the players too without a serious overhaul of the advancement system.

But the game probably works pretty well to level 6ish.

There's a feedback document being put together by people posting on the Discord channel and I actually just added some commentary to this effect. NPC hitpoint scaling is still the same as it was in 1.6 where PCs would regularly gain additional weapon mounts as they leveled up, which was basically the game's form of damage scaling. This got rolled back in 1.7 because it was bogging the game down with a lot of rolling, except NPCs have retained the same degree of HP scaling.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

TwingeCrag posted:

The stopgap solution is just as a GM not add that extra HP onto the enemy. And be careful with armor values

Another suggestion which I've proposed (along with looking at NPC hitpoint scaling) is to consider giving PCs some form of damage scaling, such as adding +X/Y/Z to aux/main/heavy+superheavy weapons at Tier II and Tier III.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
Doubleposting but Word of Tom is that he's going to take a crack at doing a typo/errata pass this weekend which includes looking at NPCs some, I'll drop a link as soon as something becomes available.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

TwingeCrag posted:

This game is great, although as i tried to put together a pick up game with pubbies, one of them publicly melted down on discord... which was pretty unfortunate.

Are you talking about the dude who's constantly bitching up a storm about how successive drafts have "broken his builds" and took to the feedback channel to drag his GM for various reasons until another person involved in the game stopped by to go "actually what happened is this" or is this someone else?

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

TwingeCrag posted:

Same guy. I'm Shikami in the discord

You have my sincerest condolences, that dude sucks.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

DalaranJ posted:

Have they said what the final distribution method for this game will be?

Really the reason I’m asking is because I’d like to get Broken Worlds without signing up for Patreon for the sole purpose of getting Broken Worlds.

Tom's said that once the game is actually finished in terms of rules that his plan is to do a Kickstarter to raise money for layout and art and then do a pdf/PoD release through Drivethru. There won't be an actual hardcopy print run or anything as he doesn't want to deal with the hassles involved.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
So remember when I said Harrison Armory had a mech for the purpose of committing planetary genocide?

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
Another day, another mech. This time from SSC:

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

sponszi posted:

There's some more changes coming soon right? My group is kinda waiting to the dust to settle from 1.7 before converting 1.6 characters. also where is the pegasus art abaddon. what are you hiding.

Like most revisions, what was originally supposed to simply be a quick numbers pass has evolved into a more substantial overhaul so yes, more changes are coming but I have no real timetable at this point. What I know is that among other things:

1). SP values are being adjusted across the board. All mechs are getting a slight bump in default SP and a number of systems are having SP costs adjusted downwards, for example grenades will only be 1 SP (and maybe mines as well). According to Tom, the Goblin will no longer have more SP than any other mech in the game.

2). Tangential to the Goblin, part of what's going into the new revision is a number of systems are being looked at and evaluated, and either replaced with more interesting versions or shuffled around to other mechs. The Goblin was noted as being a sort of "walled garden" of hacking stuff so some of its kit is being spread out while it's getting new things in their place. The Goblin is receiving its very own gun called the Autopod, the Swallowtail's Adaptive Paint is giving way to a light machinegun which can ignore LoS, the Drake is getting a concussion missile system to knock people around, etc.

3). Target Lock is getting changed. In 1.7, with the removal of Focus and the change in how drones work, Target Lock was basically left kind of vestigial, being a full action to apply a minor bonus if you managed to succeed on the check, and enemies could easily shed it for less action than you used to apply it. Instead Target Locking is moving to a quick action and instead of a +1 Accuracy for everyone it's now a +2 Accuracy for the first person to use it, so it's akin to an X-Wing Minis target lock. Also a new talent tree for spotting targets is being added, along with a new talent tree for Launcher-type weapons.

4). NPCs didn't get much of a pass in 1.7 but they'll be getting one in what's being worked on. The gist is that NPCs will have more hitpoints at Tier I but gain comparatively less as Tiers increase, to go along with the fact that weapon mounts no longer steadily accumulate as they did in previous versions of the game.

5). The Iskander's active ability is going to no longer affect friendlies in the area, and it's gaining a new benefit to its passive to allow it to deploy an entire stack of mines at once instead of one at a time.

6). General numbers tweaks and bugfixes.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
Holy fuckin poo poo the new edition is out, 1.7.5 is up for download.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Impermanent posted:

the discord invite is broken can you update it please

poo poo, I guess I didn't set it to never expire. Here, try this and I'll also update the OP with it.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib


An absolute unit.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Blisster posted:

The Tortuga is dope.

Anybody have some interesting builds? I am curious how the tech attacks and the heat system work in practice. I remember tech was considered underpowered in the last version but I really like the idea of a tiny stealthy mech bringing down enemies with hacking.

At the moment heat damage is in kind of a tricky spot. Heat damage was lowered in general and NPC heat capacities went up, but the flipside of this is that overheating conventional NPCs now simply automatically shuts them down, and while they can boot back up it's still basically a full turn stun. So overheating NPCs is better than it was when it just prompted a regular overheating check. On the other hand heat damage and hitpoint damage don't really work together at all, so if you're the one person dealing heat and everyone else is doing damage then you aren't really operating on the same page, so to speak. Tom's mentioned he may be fiddling with heat capacities and such if people continue to feel like it's a bit too weak, but if it winds up too easy to slap stuns on enemies that could also be a problem.

Hacking aside from heat though is still pretty good with a lot of utility and control abilities in the Goblin and Minotaur, and hacking systems have been spread around throughout the licenses too so you can grab some stuff if you're an SSC-focused pilot, for example.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib


According to Tom, the black Event Horizon sphere isn't the Ushtabi, it's the containment field for the Ushtabi. You don't want to let the containment field go down.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Blisster posted:

HORUS was already my favourite and the creepy mech designs are only making it more so.

Has anyone found any good online plays of Lancer? There's a couple partially completed pbp games on rpgnet of version 1.5 and one super old youtube video series. I don't have time to run a game yet so I want to live vicariously.

There are a number of campaigns that have recently started up through the Discord channel, including one that's just starting a PbP playthrough of No Room For a Wallflower, and it's open for anyone to read. Another game uses voice but they've discussed recording it, and there's another still in the preliminary stages.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
For those of you who don't check the game recruitment thread, there's a brand new Lancer CYOA starting up right over here.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
Triple posting? I don't give a gently caress.

Anyway some comments have been raised regarding some of the Goblin's hacking options being a bit lackluster under the latest iteration of the game, namely Celestial Paradigm Shift, so Tom's been tinkering with some ideas for making the Goblin even more of an annoying tech wizard.

quote:

hey so
now that I feel good about the base game systems somewhat
its time to go nuts
not that nuts

here's some of the new goblin stuff
Gain the following full tech options:
Construct Eidolon: You create a data construct that confuses systems into thinking it is real. The construct is a line 4, size 1 object that grants light cover to allies, and can look like almost anything. It provides obstruction to enemies, but not to allies (allies inside of it can be attacked and enemies can trace line of sight to it normally, but benefit from cover). Targets that are knocked back or involuntarily moved can move through it normally. Any target adjacent to the object that passes a successful systems check and takes a quick action can destroy the object. Otherwise, it is immune to all damage and lasts until the end of the current challenge.
Construct False Idol: You choose either yourself or an allied target in your sensor range, creating an illusory data duplicate of your target at any free space in sensor range. Any target that wishes to attack or take hostile action against your target and can see the decoy must first pass a systems check or believe the decoy is the real target until the end of their turn, attacking the decoy instead. It is the same size as your target, can benefit from cover, has evasion 5, 5 e-defense, and 15 HP. If it takes heat, is reduced to 0 HP, or the current challenge ends, it dissipates. You can only have one decoy active at a time, but can create a new one by taking this action again (the old one dissipates).
Gain the following options for Invasion:
Liturgicode: Create 1d3 size 1 data constructs in free adjacent spaces to your target. None can be placed adjacent to another. Any target (allied or enemy) that passes through these constructs takes 2 heat. They last until the end of the current challenge. Any actor can destroy these constructs by using a quick action and passing a successful systems check, and you can destroy them as a free action.
Celestial paradigm shift: You create a size 5 zone that must fully overlap your target. Each space a target moves in this zone deals 1 heat to them, allied or enemy. It lasts until the end of the current challenge. Any actor can destroy this zone by using a quick action and passing a successful systems check, and you can destroy it any time as a free action.

also the Mimic Gun now has all ranged weapon types
that might create some funky interactions
or make it stupidly powerful
but I think it's sort of an ok weapon as is so let's try it out
that means it counts as a CQB, Rifle, Launcher, and Cannon simultaneously by the way

I'm also rewriting OSIRIS
it's a little boring as is
and creates some funky interactions
it now gives you a full tech action called PLUNGE INTO THE DUAT
so uhh
that's a thing

All of this is of course subject to change.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Anniversary posted:

Ignorant opinion: hacking never seemed worth it to me.

How wrong am I?

It's varied from edition to edition. Early in the game's history hacking was ludicrously OP, it got tamped down more and more to the point where it was extremely action inefficient, now it's back to more useful levels imo. The main difference is that hacking used to be primarily all about dealing massive amounts of heat whereas now it's more utility based. The Minotaur's PREDATOR/PREY Concepts and various lockdown abilities or the Goblin's Puppet Code letting you walk enemies out of cover or over cliffs. A few of these utility hacks got spread out to some other licenses, mainly SSC stuff, to try and give some more variety to people who want to do some hacking instead of going "just play a Goblin" so it looks like this is an attempt to put some more dynamic options back in the Goblin's hands. Another thing which has helped hacking is the new action economy which allows you to skirmish and hack in the same turn instead of always having to choose one or the other.

All that said, Tom's also mentioned that he'll probably be looking at lowering NPC heat caps somewhat, which means that overheating the opposition may also be more viable going forward as well.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
The thing is you can absolutely ignore hacking if you want to, the creators don't seem to be going for a D&D-party-comp setup where someone has to play the designated hacker, you can all just roll big robots with guns and shoot stuff, but the developing idea seems to be that those who want to play hackers should have a robust toolkit of unique options at their disposal to do things other than just shoot heat at people. The game's definitely still in a fine-tuning stage at the moment, so relative power levels of various builds and strategies are still in flux, but that's the idea anyway.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Anniversary posted:

Yeah that makes sense and seems like a decent goal on their part.

I switched to Pegasus for fun times, so I'm one of those people. ;)

The neat thing with the Pegasus is the Mimic Gun is (provisionally) going to count as EVERY weapon type now, which means you can do some crazy poo poo by combining various talents that normally wouldn't mix together, so you could use Vanguard, Crack Shot, and Siege Specialist abilities with it all mixed together. I admit I didn't care much for the Mimic Gun before but that's changing my mind on it.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Anniversary posted:

Yes. Please.

Still not crazy about having to roll for a weapon every round? Or did that change?

No I think that's staying in for now. If/when Tom gets more actual play feedback concerning it he may (or may not) change it, it's still pretty new.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

LimitedReagent posted:

I haven't been running Lancer for too long, but my experience with hacking by the PCs is almost entirely getting Lock On. Which is useful, but nothing to write home about.

On the GM side, I've had a great time with hacking. I've had a bunch of technicals and operator NPCs in the last mission, and they've been doing a number on the players. Mostly heat build up, lock ons, and causing impairment, but it's been hampering them heavily.

Lock On is substantially better in 1.7.5 but largely in relation to things which proc off of it. In particular, the new Spotter talent tree lets people cash in locks for bonus actions which is incredibly useful. Have your friends slap on some Autopods and go to town.

But speaking of hacking, Tom's working on some stuff:

quote:

here's the new OSIRIS
(subject to change as always)
Your mech gains the AI property and the following Full Tech Action
Hurl into the Duat (Full tech): You pull your target’s systems into Legionspace and unleash an incredibly powerful system attack. Make a tech attack against a target in your sensor range. On hit, you inflict the First Gate effect on your target. The next time you successfully hit any target with this action in the same challenge (even a different target), you inflict the Second Gate effect instead (then the third, and finally the fourth). When the Fourth Gate effect is inflicted, this action resets to the First gate again, or when you rest or take a full repair.
- First Gate: Your target is crippled and impaired until the end of your next turn.
- Second Gate: Your target is stunned until the start of your next turn.
- Third Gate: You control your target’s normal movement next turn (excluding boosts, etc)
- Fourth Gate: Until the end of your next turn, your target flips allegiance. All targets that it would treat as enemies, it instead treats as allies, and all targets it treats as allies, it instead treats as enemies, acting as such. It is treated like a friendly NPC for the same duration (and can be activated like one, but not if it already acted this round). If you or any allied target damages or makes an attack roll against this target (such as grappling it, etc) this effect immediately ends.

A bit later he suggested that he was going to drop it from a Full Tech to a Quick Tech with a 1/round limitation on it.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
So this may be spoilers for anyone who's playing the No Room For a Wallflower adventure but Miguel just uploaded part two for the very first time since the game was first released and boy howdy does a whole lot of poo poo get real in this one.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
"Can my mech have four arms? And tassels?"

My friend, you can do whatever you want to be.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

PoultryGeist posted:

I'm sorry, does that mech have a popped collar?

Well the description Tom gave for it says "This frame is usually used by particularly skilled and prestigious (or reckless) pilots" so yeah, probably. HA really seems to be all about those top-heavy designs. The Napoleon has something similar going on only it looks more like an EOD bomb suit.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Cassa posted:

More than the Tokugawa? Impressive.



I think it's the big ol' dome head that does it.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
That looks really fuckin cool and if you haven't dropped by the Discord channel to brag about it there you really ought to do so.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib


Welcome to the GUN SHOW. The gun show is also the spike show.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib


When it's tea time but you still have a high-value target to eliminate.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

Blisster posted:

That Swallowtail art is awesome.

I finished watching Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans recently and it made me realize this game has a severe lack of actual lances.

I guess the Vlad sort of counts but it's not really the same feeling as blasting around at high speeds skewering people.

I am finally off work in two days so I will be running this game soon. Can't wait to try it out for real.

According to Tom the Vlad may be getting an actual for-real lance in the next edition of the game. The Nailgun and Impaler are being consolidated and it's also getting an area caltrop dispenser that creates zones of difficult terrain which doles out AP damage to mechs passing through it. Also the Nelson's war pike is getting some tweaks including possibly going up to Threat 3.

But hey, what if you don't like lances? What if you like guns? No, I mean big guns. No, bigger than that. Bigger...bigger...



Perfect.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

PoultryGeist posted:

So Gundam: IBO has come up several times in LANCER chat, is it understandable for someone who's only Gundam exposure has been a couple of random Wing episodes?

Yeah, it's basically completely standalone as its own thing. It's also officially free to watch on youtube.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

40 Proof Listerine posted:

For folks handy with sprite work, tactics games using 16x16 tiles (common on Game Boy Advance) for a 30x30 map scale up very handily for a 60x60 map in roll20, which isn't far off from the 50x50 recommended.

One thing I'll recommend here is that 1.7 and 1.7.5 underwent a bit of a global range compression to make games easier for people to run at the tabletop, so the default assumption of a map being 50x50 is no longer quite held as a default assumption. I don't know if there's a new "official" baseline size but 30x30 might not be a bad size to use, actually. You can still use maps as large as you'd like, just be aware that weapon ranges and movement speed has been scaled somewhat downward (range 30 weapons are now usually around range 20, for example).

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Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

40 Proof Listerine posted:

I noticed this in 1.7.5, as the old tales of 50-range Barbarossas are slightly reduced (I can only get it to ~43 or so with the +range SSC Core Bonus, Stabilizer Weapon Mod from SSC Monarch II and H.A. Barbarossa II Siege Stabilizers).

Has there been any word if this philosophy is making it to the NPC templates? Case in point, Sniper Template starts at Range 30.

There are a number of odd holdovers and discrepancies in the NPC section yeah, I've gone through and noted a bunch of them in a feedback document for Tom to go through at a later point and I'll poke him about it if I need to. I do expect things like the range 30 sniper rifle to go down but I'm not really an official Lancer RPG Team Member so don't take that as the word of god or anything.

Also maps can absolutely be as big as you want, there's nothing that really breaks if you run it that way, the compression came about because people were finding a 50x50 default to be cumbersome at the table but on something like roll20 you probably have an easier time handling the logistics.

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